


How Bucky Barnes Worked Two Jobs in 1937

by JustAnotherUnderstudy



Series: I Remember Your Mom [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Remembers, Bucky Barnes Returns, F/M, Fuck Or Die, I Blame Tumblr, I Don't Even Know, Minor Character Death, Older Woman/Younger Man, Protective Bucky Barnes, Secret Relationship, What Have I Done, Why Did I Write This?, Yeah so this is something, but i couldn't help myself, kinda angsty, kinda smutty, really off the wall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-11
Updated: 2016-05-11
Packaged: 2018-06-07 18:20:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6819013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustAnotherUnderstudy/pseuds/JustAnotherUnderstudy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yeah, so I kinda have this weird thing in my head about Bucky and Sarah. This is one of those stories.</p>
            </blockquote>





	How Bucky Barnes Worked Two Jobs in 1937

**Author's Note:**

> There was this horrible meme I saw a while back on tumblr right after one of the Civil War trailers came out. It had Bucky telling Steve he remembered his mom's name was Sarah, only the meme had him just say "I remember your mom." I hated it, so of course I became obsessed with it.
> 
> I thought for sure with all the weird stuff I've read on fanfiction sites I could find something someone else wrote to satisfy this ridiculous itch. Alas, my search was fruitless. But my mind wouldn't give it a rest.
> 
> This is pretty lame. IMO. Who knows, I might even delete this. I don't know. I was just tired and didn't want to do anything else today. Yes, I wrote this today.
> 
> Un-betad, un-tested, un-restrained. Sorry for everything.

The figure huddled over the grave was out of place. Most people visited the newer section of the cemetery where the flat stones concealed by divots in the grass made the area appear more like a park where children could play than a place entrenched in sadness and grief.

The small tombstone was worn with age, cracks around the edges from the long hot summers and the longer, colder winters. But the name was still legible.

Sarah Rogers.

“She’s next to dad.”

Steve’s voice seemed to float over the piercing cold wind.

He looked at the stone next to Sarah’s.

Joseph Rogers.

He never knew Steve, never knew Sarah well enough.

Bucky set the flowers on the grave.

“I remember,” he said.

~~~~~

Bucky checked himself in the glass of the subway window. Mostly it was to calm his nerves. He’d only been to the place he was heading twice and he was still afraid of being found out. It might be easier than trying to get a girl to do what he wanted without marrying her, but it was costly, and more than a little illegal.

When he got off at his stop, Bucky swallowed down his nerves and tried to look as natural as he could, knowing where he was heading and that his folks would likely tan him good if they ever found out.

He didn’t look out of place in his coat and tie, the businessmen walking past him didn’t give him a second glance. But his fedora was a little lower on his forehead than he usually wore it and it had nothing to do with the sunshine overhead.

The bell over the door tinkled as he walked in. The proprietor didn’t smile, just took his name and money and gave him a key. Bucky ascended the stairs to the third floor, forcing back his nerves. He’d be feeling good in another few minutes, he just had to keep his courage up until then.

Courage.

Steve didn’t think it was courage at all. He hadn’t been impressed in the slightest last year when Bucky had told him where he’d gone. He didn’t tell Bucky outright that he thought his friend was a jerk, but his look said everything.

Bucky didn’t tell him a few months later when he went again. Instead he waited until Steve was in the hospital. It had been even better that time, probably because it helped Bucky work off the stress he always felt when Steve was sick and had to be hospitalized.

At the third floor, Bucky pushed open the stairwell door and walked to the room number the key matched. He pushed it in the lock with shaky hands, reminding himself that for an hour he got to forget how sick his friend was, and how worried Steve’s mom was.

She always worried. Though she never showed it, Bucky noticed. He saw the way her shoulders seemed weighed down by the burden, not only of the sickness, but also of the financial needs. He’d heard his parents talking once not long ago about how much debt Sarah Rogers must be in and how sometimes they thought it might not be a blessing if Steve would finally succumb to his illness. He’d been angry at first, until he saw Sarah the next day, the false smile on her face as she greeted him, belied only by a tint of sadness in her eyes.

Bucky twisted the lock and pushed open the door.

Only to look right into those same eyes.

The woman on the bed could not be Sarah Rogers, his mind was telling himself, even as she gasped and pulled the sheets up around her to cover her scantily clad body.

He closed the door behind him quickly, lest someone see her like this.

“What are you doing here, Bucky,” her voice was a hoarse whisper, her eyes full of fear.

If anyone knew what she was doing, hell, if the landlord found out, she’d be put out onto the street, she’d lose her job.

If Bucky thought he was terrified before, now he was petrified.

“Did you follow me?” she asked.

The fear in her eyes was unnatural. She looked like a wild animal caught in a trap and Bucky tried to think of something to assure her.

“I, no, I just came to, uh,” he started, then realized what an ass he’d sound like if he told her. Not that she couldn’t figure out what he was doing there.

“Why are you here, Mrs. Rogers?” he asked quietly, still standing by the door.

“I,” she started but buried her face in her hands.

Without thinking, Bucky went to her and took her in his arms. He sometimes saw his mother do that when Sarah would find everything to be too much, when Steve would come so close to the end that they were all just waiting for the bad news.

“I’m sorry,” She cried softly. “Please don’t tell anyone.”

“I’ll never tell a soul,” he said. “But why are you here?”

He couldn’t imagine it was for the same reason he was here. A woman as beautiful as Mrs. Rogers surely could find a husband if she wanted the sex.

“I need the money,” she said. “For Steve’s hospital bill.”

Bucky held her more tightly as he realized what she was saying. 

They sat that way for several minutes before Sarah pulled herself together.

She took a deep breath, maybe to give herself courage before she spoke.

“Now that you’re here, we have no choice,” she said.

He shook his head adamantly.

“No, I won’t,” he said.

“If you don’t, he’ll beat me and he might even tell my landlord or my boss,” she said.

“He doesn’t have to know,” Bucky said.

“He watches,” she said.

Bucky felt his stomach twist.

“Watches?” he barely breathed out.

Sarah nodded then pointed to a spot on the far wall. He turned to look but couldn’t make anything out.

“There’s a small panel he slides open, sometime in the middle of an, um, appointment,” she explained. “If he doesn’t like what he sees…”

Her voice trailed off and Bucky felt more hopeless than he ever had in his life.

He turned to her and felt tears spring to his eyes.

“I can’t,” he said. “I care about you. And Steve would kill me if he ever knew.”

“I’m not about to tell Steve any of this,” she said.

She closed her eyes and leaned forward to press her lips against his neck. He shuddered, not with pleasure, but fear. If he didn’t follow through Sarah would be in a worse predicament than she was now. If he did follow through, she’d at least have money for Steve’s bills.

Bucky threaded his fingers into her hair to palm her skull and gently pull her back. He looked into her eyes. She was so sad, the depth of her pain shook him, what she’d been forced into disgusted him. Her sacrifice for her son, though…

Bucky loved his parents, he loved his sister, he loved Steve as much as he loved all of them, but he had never loved anyone more than he loved Sarah Rogers at this moment.

He kissed her slowly and deeply, reveling in the taste of her lips. The salt of their tears mixed and Bucky wondered if this wasn’t what it meant to truly make love. He slowly explored her body, taking note of every hitched breath, every slight sigh, every time she breathed out his name in pleasure.

Then she took her time with him, they explored each other with their lips and hands and tongues, the passion desperate and fearful.

She sheathed him with her mouth and sucked at him as he whispered her name. He had never known such great pleasure. She made all the other girls he’d been with seem like nothing. Finally, he pulled her up and kissed her before turning her on her back. She spread her legs for him, her naked body completely open. This time, when he looked into her eyes, the fear was nearly gone. He made up his mind then and there that he never wanted to see one bit of fear in her again.

He slowly pressed into her and she moaned out his name.

“Sarah,” he breathed into her ear. “Oh, god, you feel so good.”

Once he was inside, he thrust into her slowly at first, then harder as the pressure built up in his cock. He slipped one hand between them and she whimpered. She began to quiver around him and Bucky pressed his mouth to hers to swallow her cry and his own as he came inside her.

They were both sticky with sweat when they finished. Bucky kissed the droplets off her forehead as he caught his breath.

He’d never felt so close to someone, never understood the word intimacy more than he did now.

He stood off the bed and pulled her hand to follow him into the bath. He filled the tub and then sat inside and pulled her back to his chest as she sat down with him. He bathed her slowly, spending extra time on all the areas she’d found pleasure in. Then he slipped his hand between her legs and pleasured her as he placed kisses down her neck and shoulder.

She bit her lip as she began to come and Bucky put his hand over her mouth.

“Cry out,” he said.

And she did into his hand. Her body shook and trembled in his arms, and the water sloshed up to the edge of the tub.

“I’m going to buy you for the rest of the night,” he said as he dressed.

She shook her head.

“Don’t tell me no, Sarah,” he said. “I won’t be able to sleep knowing you’re still here.”

She took a deep breath and Bucky helped her dress into her street clothes.

He gave the man the money, all he’d made that week, but it was worth every penny. He held her as they took the train home, then walked up to her apartment with her. He accepted her invitation inside then he undressed her and put her into her sleeping gown. He took his clothes off down to his undershirt and shorts then he laid down with her in her small bed.

Neither of them spoke. Sarah didn’t ask him what he was doing. He hoped she didn’t think he was only doing this because he’d purchased her for the evening. He just couldn’t leave her now. He couldn’t face his parents knowing what they might think of her for doing this. To Bucky, it was the most beautiful thing, and to think that men were touching her who had no comprehension of the type of woman she was, made him sick.

He drifted to sleep with Sarah’s steady breath across his chest, and his mind formulating a plan to get her out of her situation.

~~~~

Bucky spent the next week going everywhere to ask for extra work. He took everything people would give him, but at the end of the week, he realized he still didn’t have enough to help Sarah. 

He also knew she’d been going back each night, and that thought troubled him. Each morning, he went to her apartment and tended to her. He made sure she ate as good a breakfast as she would. He brushed out her hair and dressed her. Then he held her and promised her he’d find some way to make everything right.

Finally, he fell on an idea that he knew she’d never approve.

“I can’t let you do that,” she said.

“Sarah, do you really want to keep doing this?” he asked.

“Steve is my son, he’s my responsibility,” she replied.

“He’s my best friend,” he retorted. “And he made me promise that if anything happened to him I’d take care of you.”

“He meant if he died,” she said.

“He didn’t specify,” Bucky said.

“But you have your whole life…”

Bucky cut her off.

“What will happen to me if people find out?” he asked.

He knelt before her and took her hands in his.

She couldn’t answer, but only shrugged.

“What will happen to you if people find out?” he asked.

She closed her eyes and he knew she had finally given in. The tears began to pour from her eyes and Bucky pulled her into his arms.

He rubbed his hand in circles on her back to soothe her and handed her his handkerchief to dry her eyes and face.

When she looked up at him, her sadness threatened to swallow him alive. And he did the only thing that he’d seen so far that had pushed it aside. He leaned down and pressed his lips to hers.

It was nearly as tentative as their first time. This time, though he knew no one was watching, he was more terrified. This time, it was for real. He really wanted this, her, them together.

He picked her up and carried her to her room.

She shook her head when he laid her on the bed.

“It’ll be too noisy,” she explained.

He set her on her feet then took the blankets off her bed and spread them on the floor. He kissed her and undressed her before he laid her out on the blanket and undressed himself. In her eyes he saw her fear and her need. 

Once he was naked, he knelt at her feet and pushed her knees apart. He kissed the inside of her thigh and pressed his finger against her clit. Her quiet sigh shook him and he had to fight back the emotions and his instant need.

He opened her folds and licked her. She was already so wet. Bucky had only the vaguest notion of what he was doing. He’d read it in a book, but never tried it. It was supposed to give the woman maximum pleasure, or so the book claimed, and that was what he wanted for Sarah. 

He recalled the instructions and squeezed her clit between his lips. She shook and stifled a cry with her hands. 

“Oh, god, Bucky,” she sighed. “Oh, god, that is so good.”

He wondered if she’d ever had a customer do this to her. Probably not, he figured. He’d never even considered pleasuring either of the girls he’d paid for. The pleasure was all his for the price. 

He pressed his tongue inside her and was rewarded with a strangled noise from her throat.

Had any man ever pleased her this way? Had Steve’s father ever been this good to her? Was Bucky her first, the first to have his mouth here? 

“Bucky, I,” she choked back a sob. 

He licked her out and returned his lips and tongue to her folds. Her head was thrown back and she had bit down on her lip, the whimpers from her throat encouraged him to be more voracious.

“Yes, Bucky, yes,” her whine and cries drove him and, as she came, he pushed two fingers inside her.

As she bucked into his hand, he leaned back onto his knees and looked down at her. It was obvious he had completely wasted her. She finally stilled and stared, glassy eyed, at the ceiling. Her body was completely still save for her chest heaving as she gasped, her lungs desperate for air. 

He leaned down and pressed his lips into the valley between her breasts. His movement didn’t seem to register with her. Bucky felt a feral grin come to his face and he began to bite at her breast, next to her nipple. Still hardly a reaction. There was a red mark from his teeth by the time she began to notice what he was doing.

“Bucky?” she gasped as he bit down harder.

A sudden sense of possession came over him like nothing he’d ever known. He found himself jealous of Joseph Rogers for ever touching her, and those men who thought her body was nothing more than something to pleasure themselves with he hated like no one he ever had before.

He pulled his condom on quickly then sank into her hard, his lips coming down on her to stop her scream.

He thrust hard, never letting up. Finally, he couldn’t breathe so he pulled his lips away and replaced them with his hand as he thrust harder. He watched her. There was no fear in her eyes, only the same passion he felt, the same desire. No sadness, no worry, only want, only want of him.

He came and he bit down on her shoulder. She screamed into his hand and bucked up into him to bring him all out.

Again, he took her into the bath to tend to her. This time he bit across each shoulder, leaving small marks, claiming her as his and his alone. After she orgasmed again, she leaned back against him. He cupped her breasts and whispered all the dirty things he wanted to do to her. She seemed to sleep but for her quiet voice responding to him.

“Yes, Bucky, please.” 

When Steve came home, it was far more difficult to spend time alone with Sarah. Finally, he could stand it no longer. He gave her some money and told her to come to him for two hours.

Bucky couldn’t say he particularly liked prostitution. It was mostly men, men who complained about their wives and their kids and their mothers while he fucked their asses or they fucked his mouth. He hated each of them. The women he liked a bit more. There weren’t many, but those who found him he tended to with care if they weren’t the whiny sort. Many were simply needy, some asking simply for an orgasm because they’d never had one.

It made Bucky proud to know how often he pleasured Sarah when he had the chance, and gave him a greater contempt for the man who’d fathered Steve. Had he done the same?

Sarah came to him that night, a wig and glasses to hide her identity. Bucky wasn’t at the same place she’d been, but it was best for a woman not to take chances.

Two hours of pure bliss for Bucky. His hands and lips on her skin, her moans and sighs igniting his body in a way no other woman could. He hated that he had to have her here, but he would take what he could for now. Maybe one day they could have more. How, he wasn’t sure, but he’d figure something out.

~~~~~

Steve recovered and went back to school. The hospital bill was paid off and Bucky’s life returned to normal, as normal as it could be while he and Sarah carried on a secret relationship.

Until it wasn’t.

“You can’t do this,” Bucky argued.

“Bucky, it’s a way to get money without either of us having to do what we did before,” Sarah pleaded.

Bucky shook his head vigorously.

“No, it’s too dangerous,” he told her.

She scoffed.

“It’s not nearly as dangerous as what we did,” she said.

“But what if you…?” 

Bucky couldn’t finish the question.

“Bucky, this is what I do,” she said. “I’m around disease all the time.”

“But this,” he tried again.

“Is no different, it just pays better,” she said.

She touched Bucky’s face and turned him toward her.

“Bucky, I…” 

She started to reason with him but he crushed his lips to hers and held her tightly. Her arms went around his neck.

The apartment door rattled.

“Steve,” Sarah gasped as she pulled away.

She wiped the lipstick smudges off his face and he smiled and nodded to her to tell her she looked presentable.

“Sorry, Steve,” she said. “I didn’t realize it was latched.”

She opened the door to him and he walked in and set his satchel down on the table. He said hello to Bucky and started to tell Sarah about his day as he pulled out his books and notepaper.

When he turned to face them, finally, he noticed the tension.

“What happened?” he asked.

Bucky took a deep breath. 

“I’m taking a job at the TB Sanitorium,” she said. “I start next week.”

Steve opened his mouth to protest but Bucky shook his head so he only nodded in acknowledgement.

“I need to get to my shift,” she said. “I still have my night job.”

She squeezed Bucky’s arm and Bucky saw Steve’s head tilt as if he was trying to assess the level of intimacy it indicated.

Then she hugged Steve picked up her coat, and was gone.

“Are you going to walk her home?” Steve asked absently staring after her.

“I always do, don’t I?” Bucky said.

“Well, if it’s a problem,” Steve retorted.

Bucky knew he was looking for a fight so he just sighed.

“Don’t try that with me,” Bucky said. “Or anyone else for that matter.”

Steve sat heavily in the chair.

Bucky put his hand on Steve’s shoulder.

“Come on,” he said. “I need a drink.”

~~~~~

It was raining when Sarah walked out of the hospital. Bucky was waiting to walk her back to the apartment.

She put her arm through his and they walked slowly under the umbrella. 

“I don’t know what I’d do if anything happened to you,” he admitted.

“I hope you’ll take care of Steve,” she said.

He turned to her and stopped.

“That’s not what I meant,” he said.

“I know,” she sighed.

He wanted to reach up and touch her face, he wanted to take her into the shadows and brush his lips against hers. Instead he decided it was time to use his words.

“I love you,” he said.

She bit her bottom lip and nodded.

“I know,” she said softly. “I just wish.”

She sighed and Bucky wondered if she regretted everything between them.

“You can’t have a normal life this way,” she said. “You need someone closer to your age, someone who can give you children.”

“I don’t want kids,” he said. “I just want you.”

She turned sad eyes toward him.

“Please, Sarah, don’t,” he couldn’t take the sadness away tonight. Steve was home. He’d hear.

She nodded and took his hand and squeezed it.

“I love you too, Bucky,” she said.

They walked that way, hand-in-hand, the rest of the way home. There was no one out on the street in the middle of the night, only one night beat cop. 

When they arrived at the little apartment, Bucky helped her with her coat. He took her shoes and set them on the radiator to dry. He walked over to Steve’s room to check if he was sleeping. The light was out and Bucky pulled the door shut tightly.  
Then he returned to Sarah and reached up under her skirt to unclip her stockings. He rolled each down with care the laid them next to the shoes. He slid his hand back up her thigh and glanced briefly at Steve’s door. It was still closed. They’d have heard it open anyway.

He rested his hand in her crotch and rubbed her and leaned in to press his lips to hers.

“I love you,” he said again.

The he pulled his hand out and walked her to her room.

“Goodnight,” he said.

He kissed her one more time and cupped her breast through her blouse.

“Goodnight,” she breathed.

~~~~~

Bucky couldn’t be angry with Steve, or even jealous. He had no right. He’d never publicly laid claim to a relationship with Sarah so to be relegated to a back pew in the Catholic Church where Sarah’s service was held simply because he was a Jew was to be expected, he supposed.

He caught up with Steve outside the apartment. They spoke and he tried to get Steve to move in with him and his folks. Hell, his sister had a crush on Steve, maybe he could get them married off to each other and he could worry about them at the same time.

But Steve was too stubborn, probably got that from his mother, Bucky thought.

Later, though, he went to the graveside. It was bitterly cold and he wrapped his coat tightly around himself.

Sarah Rogers.

It was a simple tombstone. Nothing big and gaudy, which was good because Sarah never would have wanted anything like that. Her birth, her death, both commemorated there. She lay next to her husband because, of course, that’s what people would think she’d like.

He knelt down and laid the flowers he’d brought on the grave.

“I’ll never forget you, Sarah,” he managed to choke out though his throat constricted with emotion. “No matter what happens.”

**Author's Note:**

> OK, yeah, this is a huge stretch of the imagination. I have read multiple arguments that, because Sarah Rogers was a nurse she and Steve would not have been poor. I think, however, that because of Steve’s medical expenses, poverty would have been a reality for them. Hence…


End file.
